Joy Metzler is a recently separated Air Force veteran who left the service citing U.S. funding and partnership of the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. She started speaking out while active duty, becoming a member of Veterans For Peace and continuing her advocacy through joining VFP’s 40 day fast in NYC.
A year ago, I was still writing my conscientious objector package to separate from the U.S. Air Force, because I was horrified by the atrocities being committed with U.S. tax dollars and military manhours. Today, I am reflecting on my completion of a 40-day fast, Veterans & Allies Fast for Gaza. I ended my fast by being arrested (along with 28 other veterans as well as our allies) for shutting down 2nd Avenue in front of the NYC Israeli Consulate.
I was granted conscientious objector status as a 2d Lt and approved to separate on April 25, 2025. This happened around a week before Mike Ferner, a former VFP executive director, approached the organization with an idea that he and another veteran – Phillip Tottenham – had hatched. They were proposing going on a fast outside the U.S. Mission to the UN to protest the U.S.-Israeli-manufactured famine that Palestinians in Gaza were suffering under. It was as natural as breathing to respond to his email that day and say, “I’m in.”
Putting my body on the line was an idea I was already used to from the military. Now, however, I had a new focus: get humanitarian aid to Gaza under UN authority and stop U.S. weapons shipments to Israel. Two very simple requests. I had a plan to gradually taper off my calorie intake to not shock my body when I went fully onto the fast of 250 calories a day, a value which was decided upon based on an Oxfam study that concluded that Palestinians were only getting 250 calories on average a day. I also volunteered to take on the bulk of the team’s social media work, and all of us core fasters were taking on interviews, external protests, and oftentimes were standing outside the U.S. Mission for the entire time from 0930 to 1500 in the direct sunlight.
Suffice it to say, we all ran out of steam after a few weeks.
I arrived in NYC on May 28, and all the veteran core fasters – Mike, Phil, Ken Ashe, and Russell Brown– were in high spirits. Phil and I often would participate in other events held around the city to flyer for our fast and make connections. Slowly, though, they all began to slow down. And it was scary. People who were bright, peppy, and full of energy were soon shuffling around like zombies, looking like they were about to fall asleep standing up. About halfway through the fast, we had to beg Mike to go to the VA because of how sick he looked, after which we found out that he was actually near death due to critically low potassium levels. During the fast, we kept getting hit with worse and worse news. The U.S. vetoed a resolution calling for humanitarian aid and a ceasefire. Despite a resolution of Uniting for Peace passing the UN General Assembly, the massacres continued. Hundreds of Palestinians were being killed a day, some directly as a result of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which was implemented during the fast. The abduction of the Madleen and the violent suppression of the global march to Gaza by Egyptian authorities also took place during the strike. As did the Israeli and U.S. strikes on Iran. And the starvation was taking a separate physical and mental toll on all of us.
Then came Day 40. It was a day we had all been preparing for, for quite a while. The fast had been long, tiring, and difficult, and I had joined on the condition that we would make breaking the fast mean something. So two plans were set in motion – we would shut down the street outside the Israeli Consulate and read the names of children killed by Israel, and Mike would go and cover the front of the U.S. Mission in blood. We took 29 arrests that day, consisting of veterans, Jewish Voice for Peace activists, and other allies from out of state.
So what did we accomplish? Well, I think we accomplished what we set out to do, even if we didn’t see our two demands met. We had conversations with people, we saw the fast expand to almost 800 people worldwide, and we reminded the U.S. Mission workers and UN diplomats that we, as world citizens, stand with Palestine. For me, personally, it helped to make the struggle of the Palestinians more real to me. I now understand how it feels for my body to shut down slowly and to watch those I care about go through the same process, but we have the ability to stop and get medical care or simply eat more. Palestinians don’t have that luxury. Mothers and fathers are forced to watch their children starve while Israel withholds aid. While I was sitting in a jail cell, I was making plans with other people for that evening. When Palestinians are detained, they’re disappeared by Israeli forces. The question now is how to keep the movement going, and who will take the torch now?
Our final demand is “escalate.” The situation in Gaza has far surpassed what can be described in words, and the responsibility – the duty to oppose genocide – rests on everybody in the U.S. and in the world. If our international bodies refuse to move to end the genocide, we must move ourselves. We must disrupt, boycott, strike, and even put our bodies on the line if called. We’re closing the chapter on this fast, but I know that our fasters (to include those worldwide) are fired up and ready to continue.
End the genocide, end the apartheid, and free Palestine!
By: Joy Metzler
Source: Mondoweiss
